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Reasons Not to Use Google (2015)
- magashna 7y agoHad no clue about Google storing purchases made connected to a gmail account. That is discomforting.
- ds0 7y agoYeah, I was pretty intimidated just looking at it for the first time. Seeing my purchases in plain view like that tipped me over into using a competing mail server. https://www.cnbc.com/2019/05/17/google-gmail-tracks-purchase-history-how-to-delete-it.html https://www.cnbc.com/2019/05/17/google-gmail-tracks-purchase...
- VikingCoder 7y agoYour gmail account stores the purchases. Google can help you search the purchases. If you see either of those as odd, then I pretty much don't get your viewpoint. But sure, the next question is does Google explicitly USE that data in any other way. That's a different question, though.
- magashna 7y agoit doesn't store the purchase, it stores the email, then parses it into a list of purchases. Also if you delete the email, the purchase list remains.
- inetknght 7y agoI don't need Google's help to search through my purchase emails. My emails are well-filtered into categories. And where that's not sufficient, search terms aren't difficult to use. Google automatically collecting a list of purchases goes beyond what I expect an email provider to do.
- beatgammit 7y agoPersonally, I'm not a fan of email being plaintext and think everyone should use encrypted email (GPG, ProtonMail, Tutanota, etc). I think it's absolutely inappropriate for Google to track such things even if it has access, and it shouldn't have access IMO in the first place.
- greesil 7y agoI understand Stallman's viewpoint, but his personal website looks like a litany of complaints :) "What's bad about: Airbnb | Amazon | Amtrak | Ancestry | Apple | Discord | Ebooks | Eventbrite | Evernote | Facebook | Google | Intel | LinkedIn | Lyft | Meetup | Microsoft | Netflix | Patreon | Pay Toilets | Skype | Slack | Spotify | Twitter | Uber | Wendy's |"
- paulpauper 7y agohe should add deuterium to his list, too. Why does it deserve that neutron? how greedy of it.
- GoodJokes 7y agoIt looks like a series of complaints because it is. What is your point? Not into skepticism?
- dspillett 7y ago> Pay Toilets While I understand the moral absolute standpoint, he fails to state how he sees such free facilities being maintained. While in many areas this can be done by local councils and paid for via relevant taxation, or by requiring local businesses to provide free facilities as part of their requirements of doing business in the area, those options do not cover everywhere (and the latter will be fought hard by business lobbying groups). I hope he isn't naive enough to expect to be able to rely on human nature meaning the general public will keep free facilities in good working order and in a sanitary state!
- 52-6F-62 7y agoI prefer to give him the benefit of the doubt. The balance is radically weighted to the other side. Unfortunately the counter-weight must be equally radical to approach any sort of balance. He certainly strikes up some valuable discussions
- bena 7y agoStallman lives in a particular bubble and that bubble has defined his viewpoints to a degree that he cannot fathom not being able to live his life in that way. The question of "who does that" or "who pays for that" ultimately comes down to some form of slavery or coercion. Or the question is just avoided. Because "capitalism is evil". Or "what about wage slavery". Or something about how we have intrinsic value as sentient beings and shouldn't be required "to provide value" in order to "just survive". And I'm like "Ok. But who cleans the public toilet?" How do you get someone to agree to that? I'll clean my toilet, sure. But I'm not cleaning the public toilet unless I'm being forced to or I'm being compensated for doing so.
- paulpauper 7y agoit must be a lot of fun being with this guy , not being able to use so many services
- johnisgood 7y agoThere are alternatives to them. You do not have to miss out on the fun! :) For example looking at that list, his issue is not with e-books in general, but e-books from Amazon because of DRM. You buy only access to your e-books, movies (Netflix), games (Steam), and so on. You cannot even start most single player games without having logged into Steam!
- CraneWorm 7y ago> You cannot even start most single player games without having logged into Steam! A reasonable answer is to pirate everything you buy so you always have a DRM free copy.
- MrMember 7y agoI strip the DRM from all the books I "buy" from Audible and Amazon. It's an imperfect solution, since I'm still giving them money for DRM encumbered media, but I can live with that.
- GoodJokes 7y agoIt probably is since all of these services serve to alienate you from your fellow human beings in pretty insidious ways. I bet he is much more present and interesting. I stopped hanging out with people who could only regurgitate their social media lives in conversation and nothing else.
- magashna 7y agoThis is THE Richard Stallman. He would be fascinating to hang out with and hear his thoughts.
- ghaff 7y ago
- paulpauper 7y agoThe biggest problem with google is not the JavaScript but the fact hat if they delete your account you lose everything including YouTube, gmail, saved stuff, etc. and appeal is virtually impossible. Anyone that relies on google accounts is at risk of having their account closed for arbitrary reasons.
- jasode 7y ago>In general, most Google services require running nonfree Javascript code. If you refuse to run that (for instance, by running LibreJS), you'll see that you should not use those services. Well, I use Google Maps just about every single day so Stallman's advice banning Javascript is way too hardcore for me. But for sake of discussion, let's entertain what he's suggesting. What are the most practical alternatives to avoid Google's Javascript maps in 2019? - other websites like Bing Maps and even openstreetmap.org also don't work without Javascript - using local software like old CDROMs of map software means I'm using data that's 20 years old because no mainstream software publisher (e.g. Microsoft Streets, DeLorme, etc) is selling it and only cover a region instead of the entire globe. Also that CD software is proprietary and not free-as-in-libre. - using folding paper maps like Rand McNally have similar problems to CDROMs -- the maps are old and more cumbersome. - other alternatives I overlooked are ... ? Inevitably, this leads to the condescending question... "How did we get by _before_ Google Maps?!?" I got by in the past by making the usage of maps more inconvenient. EDIT to replies about OpenStreetMap: Last I checked, OpenStreetMap doesn't have publicly accessible satellite images or 3D/birdseye views or street-level 360 degree views. Openstreetcam is missing a lot of roads. I use that type of photographic imagery even more than the line drawings of streets. Is there a practical non-Javascript alternative for that data?
- overcast 7y agoThe most practical alternative is using a real map.
- TulliusCicero 7y agoI remember the days of using real maps instead of mapping apps on my phone. Those days fucking sucked.
- overcast 7y agoWell, if you're going to cry about using something that runs on the entire web, then that's your alternative. Or grab a Garmin, though I'm sure Stallman probably believes there is a mind control listening device in those too.
- raverbashing 7y agoTo Stallman one of the only technologies that's ok is Emacs running in some linux distro where your wifi might not work out of the box. Wired connections are also a problem for him as well since the provider has your identity and they can trace you. Stallman's rants, while they might not be technically wrong, should be read in the context of someone whose mindset is not the most positive one.
- rhacker 7y agoMeh, that's subjective - he's extremely cogent if you watch or read his talks. If you turn your mind to think that the society we are in is not the healthiest one, then he's very healthy.
- asdf21 7y agoThe unabomber thought the same thing, with the same flavor of absolutist "ethics"
- rhacker 7y agoNot everyone goes about changing the world like the unibomber does. Would you rather Stallman or his points never had existed in the first place? I would think the world rather evil if people couldn't strive to do things differently.
- asdf21 7y agoI'm fine with Stallman existing (of course) but his moralism is generally without merit. Sacrifices have to be made to compete in modern markets and you can't make everyone happy.
- homonculus1 7y agoAnd Hitler was a dog lover. When rms starts planting bombs, you can criticize him for that.
- yumraj 7y agoOr all the Google properties, I believe YouTube has the biggest moat and the barrier to exit, for users if not creators, because of all the content on it. Given that all this content is publicly available, And I believe there were some legal cases, such as LinkedIn v. HiQ one, which, IMNAL, but allowed scraping of public content, I wonder if an entity can legally scrape YouTube and provide non-Google access to it, while preserving creator's copyright?
- news_to_me 7y agoDefinitely. Youtube is pretty much the only Google service I still use regularly (unless chromecast counts).
- thefj 7y agoI'm pretty sure you will need the creator's permission to re host the video. Otherwise it's just piracy. In the LinkedIn case the scraping was allowed, I don't think that HiQ is creating a mirror. Also there's a case for LinkedIn not having much copywritable content there, only information. YouTube's real moat is that after years of operation they're managing to maybe break even, even with Google's insane infra. It's just doesn't seem that profitable to host all the videos for free.
- sdegutis 7y agoRichard Stallman talks a lot about freedom, but what he means by this is not what's typically meant by freedom. When we say freedom, we usually mean freedom of choice. But his version is the communist version, which is freedom from choice. His primary reasons for wanting to avoid services are not because of traditional ethical concerns. His ethics are not traditional, and he clearly states this on his personal website when he talks about pedophilia not actually being immoral. Rather, they're because these services or companies do not give our their source code under a communistic license that Stallman approves of, one that specifically restricts a user's freedom to do what he wishes with that software, and the developer's freedom to choose how people can use the software. And all of this so that consumers have totalitarian freedom over their software. This isn't how freedom works with anything else. You are allowed to buy the parts needed to make a flamethrower, but you're generally not allowed to assemble them into one. Your freedom over your property is restricted by the rights of others, which in this case includes the right to a safe environment. We should not have absolute freedom over the source code that produced the software we possess just because they are digital. We received 1s and 0s that our computer knows how to execute. This doesn't mean we have an absolute right to know how it's made. In the same way, we don't have an absolute right to know how fast food chains combine their ingredients into the perfect dish. We have some right to know what ingredients they contain for the sake of safety, but they have a right to keep the recipe secret. Communist principles are against true individual freedom, which must take into account the society that we live in and the rights of those we live with, because we don't live in a vacuum. And the GNU has fully bought into communist principles, trying to enforce limitations of freedom on individuals in the name of ultimate greater freedom for all.
- anoncake 7y ago> the communist version, which is freedom from choice. Bullshit. > Communist principles are against true individual freedom, which must take into account the society that we live in and the rights of those we live with, because we don't live in a vacuum. Even worse bullshit. It's not communists who confuse freedom with the state not doing things. > And the GNU has fully bought into communist principles, trying to enforce limitations of freedom on individuals in the name of ultimate greater freedom for all. You just criticized them for not doing that.
- 5trokerac3 7y agoOnly Stallman would begin a "reasons to not use Google" post with a rant about modern webpages requiring JavaScript, as if there aren't a million higher priority reasons TO DUMP GOOGLE. I can't help but feel that having such an extremist as the face of the FSF has greatly hindered it in its mission.
- Spearchucker 7y agoStallman is the diametric opposite of Google. As such he is ground zero of the opposition. He raises awareness and has concrete if impractical solutions. The truth we seek is, IMO, somewhere close to the Google/ad network and Stallman/privacy concerns nexus.
- 5trokerac3 7y agoThat's like saying Fascists and Communists are polar opposites. They may disagree completely on economic policy, but they're both authoritarian assholes. Stallman is only for "freedom" as long as it's his complete and unwavering vision for his personal freedom, damn everyone else.
- zucker42 7y agoI don't know if I see how your analogy extends to this situation. Are you saying you like neither Stallman or Google?
- 5trokerac3 7y agoYes, they're two sides of the same, "my way or the highway" coin. Stallman has made it clear that he would destroy the right of private digital property, if he had the power.
- cycloptic 7y agoI don't know how you draw that conclusion. The goal of the FSF, since the beginning, has been to make a computing platform that the user has full control over. They aren't the ones trying to push everyone's data into the cloud.
- rhacker 7y agoWhat we are building is the perfect society for the rule of individualism. Capitalism is the god, greed is the motivation, and not being liable is how we be careful. There's no way out. Even TNG predicted WWIII entire global population and for humanity to suffer its most embarrassing chapter to get out of it: https://memory-alpha.fandom.com/wiki/World_War_III https://memory-alpha.fandom.com/wiki/World_War_III There are other modes of life, based on trust of mankind, instead of fear of it. That's the other thing TNG shows - all those people in Starfleet - they aren't being paid to be on that ship. They're trying to show that humanity is capable of post-capitalism. It doesn't have to be this way. (That's the planet Stallman lives - or at least wants to)
- deleted 7y ago[deleted]
- asdf21 7y agoMy God, these posts attacking capitalism get tedious. Capitalism is just a codification of people's wants / needs. It's structured demand mixed with some basic contract law to hold people accountable to their own promises. That's it. If you deride capitalism you're already implicitly saying that "what people want" is "bad". By condemning the system you're already implying that even the highest desires of humans aren't good enough. >There are other modes of life, based on trust of mankind Capitalism is already based on trust of mankind, since it is based on giving people what they desire, as long as it doesn't infringe on the basic human rights of others. There are other ways to allocate resources and all of them are FAR INFERIOR which has been shown time, and time and time again.
- devmunchies 7y agocapitalism != the free market. You can have a free market without usury and interest rates (using fees and equity to replace interest)
- asdf21 7y agoWhat would you call that type of free market system? Is there a real world example?
- ta29082019 7y agoI found it interesting that OP chose to post the page for Google specifically, when there are many other services/companies listed on that page. Turns out, pearjuice is a Trump supporter (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12675679 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12675679, https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12741738 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12741738, https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12675971 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12675971) and hence has a reason to target Google, which is known for its employees opinions against Trump (https://www.nytimes.com/2018/09/12/technology/leaked-google-video-trump.html https://www.nytimes.com/2018/09/12/technology/leaked-google-...) and conservatives in general. This does not take away from the validity of the points made on the link itself, but I thought it worth mentioning.
- deleted 7y ago[deleted]
- asdf21 7y agoCan someone explain this quote to me? >Then again, maybe you shouldn't eat any fast food. It is meant for fasting, not for eating.
- ChrisArchitect 7y agoadd (2015) read more here https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13342941 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13342941